Count Szápary was always cheerful, or at any rate always wore an appearance of cheerfulness, laughing and singing with the joviality of a true Hungarian, and rejoicing in magnificent health and strength. This doubtless aided him to give confidence to his patients, who must have been trying at times with their whims and caprices. It has been given to few to benefit their fellow-creatures to a like extent, or to reap the harvest of benedictions that will forever blossom round his name. CHAPTER X MARY BARNES I see her still, in her plain black dress, coming towards the castle from the landing-stage of the steamer, and crossing the quadrangle with soft, noiseless tread, as gentle and calm as the breath of the evening breeze, bringing with her an atmosphere of comfort and peace of which we became conscious even before she had crossed the threshold. We were looking out for her with impatience and some misgivings, my brother Wilhelm and I, for the advent of a new nurse is an event of no small importance in children’s lives, and already, scarce three and four years of age as we were respectively, we had undergone the trial of parting with the dear old one who had made herself so justly beloved, and whose place was taken by a younger woman, whom we detested with equal vehemence and on equally good grounds. So we ensconced ourselves firmly in the broad window-sill to have a better view of the new-comer, wondering to ourselves which of her two predecessors she would resemble. Our doubts were dispelled even before Barnes entered the house; the quick, unerring instinct of childhood told us that many happy days were in store for us in the care of this good, kind soul, who came along as noiselessly as a leaf wafted hither by the wind. I do not think she was at all beautiful--in point of fact rather a plain-featured elderly woman, with at times a decided squint; but our eyes had quickly discerned the beauty of the soul under that homely exterior, and lovely she ever remained to us. We saw in her a sort of guardian angel, shielding us from every peril that might beset the path of childhood, watching over our health with untiring zeal, and entirely wrapped up in our happiness. For herself she seemed to ask nothing, to want nothing, to have no wishes or desires beyond those that affected the well-being of her little charges. That the motherly instinct should be so strong in her, and should, so to say, pervade her whole person, was the less surprising considering that she had, as she herself told us, from the age of ten played the part of the mother they had lost to her own younger brothers and sisters. She was the ideal nurse; scrupulous in the fulfilment of all her duties, and her honest simplicity coupled with such innate delicacy of feeling as to lend a certain refinement to her whole person. She was at her happiest as she sat, needle in hand, watching our games, and from time to time laying down her work, the more